The return of the people who don't know what a Defender is...
I guess the term "healer" can be loosely applied to an Empathy Defender because they have 4 powers out of 9, if you count ressurect, 5, whose primary function is hit point recovery.
However, I see an Empathy Defender as a buffer first a foremost, it just so happens that their way of buffing is to regenerate people's health through the damage. But there are some cases where you just really want an Empathy Defender for sure, though, if you have a Defender that can cripple the enemies to the point they are not a threat that's just as good, maybe some cases, better.
My other main Defender is a Forcefields / Electric blasts. Back when she was shiny and new, and I was still finding my way about looking for groups I just sent out tels etc... and once or twice seemed to only get grudgingly accepted onto the group. I had to say well, I put forcefields on you which stop you getting hit and losing health in the first place, so, why would you need a "healer" if the forcefield can stop most attacks harming you? Also electrical blasts I can leave the mobs without endurance and only able to perform their basic punch.
Any Defender is worthwhile to any team IMO
So the OP couldnt use Triage?...thats not in Traps?
i am thinking he never actualy did this trial..... As he would have been whining more about the pulses destroying his stuff he summoned more then about some leader. |
For those that dont know.....its not about damage or pulses doing more damage...its called any form of attack whether it be a debuff or even zero damage on antimatter....makes the pulses happen more often in that first portion..... |
When I form a Keyes, I specifically advertise "all ATs". I don't bother checking if there is 'enough healing.' I tell everyone to fill up on green inspirations, and if they 'die' to go to the hospital and refill on green inspirations.
My Keyes have no problem dealing with the pulse.
For those that dont know.....its not about damage or pulses doing more damage...its called any form of attack whether it be a debuff or even zero damage on antimatter....makes the pulses happen more often in that first portion..... |
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Okay lets see where to start on this...
1. Despite the rant the triage beacon from the traps set is NOT useless on a Keyes trial. Yes it doesn't move but I have been on trials where the beacon was set down near a computer terminal and healed the players while they cleared the IDT and then waited, with pulses going off, for the Tank to bring AM so they could use their glowies. Is it as useful as other heals no but on a trial where ANY heal is beneficial not using it simply because it isn't mobile is not a good excuse
2. Twilight Grasp does require at least one enemy to work but it does absolutely no damage. What it does do is debuff that enemy and heals your team mates. It does make it easier to do damage to your enemy but it can hardly be classified as an attack.
3. I think it was Zombie Man that clarified this but I'll chime in as well. The pulses that damage you during a Keyes trial are not affected by any thing else except the health of Anti-Matter. They go off about every 30 seconds no matter what anyone does during the trial until all three reactors are secured and then it stops. The only way to alter the pulse is to damage Anti-matter and then instead of 50-60% of your health being affected it gets worse.
Now I have done a lot of trials, all three types, and while not every leader is the smartest kid on the block .. the complete lack of many players to follow even the simpliest of instructions has made me question the overall IQ of some players.
a. Players on Lambda that have basically 1 thing to remember. Which team they are on and where it is going during the collection phase. Heck if you can't remember either of those try this... as soon as the Security Guard falls click on your team leader and follow him/her to which ever door they head towards. I have been on lambdas where 12 or more team mates were doing acid and 4 or less of us were in the warehouse after grenades.. you remember grenades..those things we use to pacify Maurader so he actually takes damage when we attack him.
b. Along the same line on the BAF Team 1 and 2 South choke points and team 3 North. And moments later the team leader from 3 is calling out to specific players to get them to the right pathway. This is a one -- 1, This is a two... 2, and this is a three .. 3. As before if you can't tell them apart the person at the top of your team list is your leader.. click on him and go where he goes. /e rolls eyes
c. Do not attack the AV until all the doors are closed on Lambda. And of course seconds later Maurader and every IDT troop on the map is suddenly in your face. Of course a part of this problem is the ever present need for players to BOMB the cut scene and then drag everything back as they try to rejoin the rest of the team that was acually doing their job and collecting acids and grenades.
d. Do not attack Anti-matter. Now a little bit of this not happening is acceptable... I have been on Keyes trials where we were battling the ADDs at a terminal and the tank pull AM in so we could activate it. In the heat of battle an AoE doesn't care what it hits it just hits so if Anti-matter is in range OPPS. But I have been on trials where by reactor 2 he was down to 70 percent.. that is an aweful lot of opps
e. Ahhh yes on the BAF... please don't attack Siege until the tank pulls him close to Nightstar's body. So as I stand there watching half the dang league is in the grass shooting at him and his ADDs. I guess they don't think the Tank can manage to taunt him into place without their help. Of course they also don't seem to be aware that every time he is attacked he stops to retaliate and we all know how slow he runs to begin with.
f. Team 3, during the BAF, is on ADDS. And then as my health drops rapidly realize about two dozen or more 9CU and MK1 vickies are crawling up my back because absolutely no one is attacking the hordes of growing adds. I have actually seen this result in trials failing. For reference purposes see comment b concerning what the numbers one, two and three look like.
Now I am not saying there aren't people out there that have no clue what a Defender is for or how to use them. I was playing them years ago when everyone assumed defender = healbot and it took a lot of time to educate people that we also buff, debuff and have actual attacks .. some of which actually add to the overall debuff we can provide (Rad/Rad for example). telling a Defender not to attack is about the stupidist thing any player can do and here is why.....
Defenders Dark Blast .. every single attack has an inherent -to hit attached which allows everyones attacks to do more damage
Radiation Blast .. every attack has a - DEF attached again making it easier to damage enemies
Electric Blast .. all attacks have a -Recovery attached so eventually any affected enemy has no end left.. no end means no way to fire off any attack or use any ability to heal.
Ice Blast .. all attack have a -speed attached
PSI blast .. three attack have a -Recharge so enemies attacks dont recharge as fast and cant be used a soften , one puts enemies to sleep and two others disorients
Sonic Blast .. all powers have a -Res so all enemies resist damage at a lower rate.
Dual Pistol .. with ammo changes every single attack can cause -speed, or -Dam debuffs.
All that leaves is Archery and Assault Rifle as the only two attack powers that don't do anything but cause DAMAGE(okay thats not quite true AR has knockback but that doesnt really debuff anything)And even with those the last time I checked the idea was to damage the enemy until they fell down and stopped trying to damage you. While a defenders damage may not come close to matching a Blasters ANY damage is good damage. Even when I am playing my Empaths I fire off attacks as fast and as often as possible I refer to it as preventative medicine.. if all the bad guys are dead then they cant cause any damage I need to heal. I have blatantly ignored leaders that told me to "just heal" and have never once been kicked off a team. And if it ever does occur rest assured that leader is getting one star as a rating and put on ignore so I never have to deal with him or her again.
�We�re always the good guys. In D&D, we�re lawful good. In City of Heroes we�re the heroes. In Grand Theft Auto we pay the prostitutes promptly and never hit them with a bat.� � Leonard
�Those women are prostitutes? You said they were raising money for stem cell research!� � Sheldon
Thankfully, most people I've encountered understand that my Dark/Rad is built for insane debuffing, though don't discredit the power of Twilight Grasp it's the most powerful heal in the game IMO. However, I have heard stories of people who acctually thought there was a "Healing Arrow" power...
The off-beat space pirate...Capt. Stormrider (50+3 Elec/Storm Science Corruptor)
The mysterious Djinn...Emerald Dervish (50+1 DB/DA Magic Stalker)
The psychotic inventor...Dollmaster (50 Bot/FF Tech Mastermind)
Virtue Forever.
Ok, at this point I think we should demand the Devs make a "Healer" AT... just so these idiots will leave Defenders alone.
... Hit it ...
Reminds me of the time I was doing the blueside respec (the Sky Raider one) on my Rad/Rad. She was my first 50 and this was when I was leveling her so it was shortly after EU launch.
We got into the reactor building and after a wipe or two at the first doorway, the leader who was also the tank told me to "stop using that green s**t and just heal!" I tried to explain that the "green s**t" was what was keeping us alive a lot longer than my crappy AoE heal but he was having none of it (I just love how there's always someone in an MMO who knows how to play your character better than you do, despite having never played those powersets ).
So I dutifully stopped debuffing or blasting and just spammed my heal. And of course the team wiped in about 10 seconds flat as I was the only support character on the team. Finally after a few of these wipes I asked if I should start using the "green s**t" again and got a grudging "Fine" from the leader. I don't know if we actually completed the trial (but I rather doubt it) but if nothing else, at least 7 people on Defiant got an object lesson in the power of Rad's debuffs that day.
Valuable, okay. But healing powers have never been under-appreciated in this game.
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How deeply that permeated past the forums to the actual game is debatable, but I have seen it show up periodically in the high level game.
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As for OP, I sympathize, I really do. I don't play defenders very often, but whenever I do I remember exactly why I use them so little. I had somebody PM me on an Empath toon to ask "Are you a healer?" and my response was "No, I'm an Empath". They responded with "LoL Empath. Riiiiight."
It's as if people don't realize that there is no set called "Healing", and Empathy works just as well as a buff set. I play an Ill/Emp troller who spends more time buffing teammates than he does healing, because with said buffs in place on the right players, healing is very rarely required, if at all, and I'd imagine a defender could easily play in a similar manner, buffing the right people who need it, attacking, and healing when someone gets themselves into trouble. |
I had mentioned Empathy in my original post as "this topic really isn't for you but you're welcome to join in anyway." note I never called it a "Healing" power set. I was just acknowledging that out of all the power sets in the game Empathy is the closest to being a healing set. It has the most heal powers of any power set and non of them require enemy targets to use.
That being said I also acknowledge the fact that non every power in Empathy is a heal and thus refuse to call them "healers" even when said Empath has some variation of the word "Heal" in their character's name I refuse to call them by name. The best Empathy Defenders I've ever teamed with don't even heal at all. With their buffs applied they don't need to.
Best example I can think of for this is one particular Empathy Defender who was wasting time healing my tanker but I kept dieing anyway because said Defender refused to use Clear Mind. This was back when toggle dropping was still a serious problem. Clear Mind is one of my favorite powers because that buff gave me the resistance I needed against toggle dropping holds. I kept dieing because the Defender was healing and not using Clear Mind. As long as I could keep my Toggles on I wouldn't even take DMG and healing would of been entirely unnecessary.
So yeah I know the befits of a good Buffing Empath and I love Empaths who Buff the team, Use their secondary for DeBuffs, and heal in an emergency allot more than the Healing Empaths who ignore all their other powers. Empathy is just the closest thing to a healer without actually being one. There are no healers in this game until the developers actually come out with a power set that is JUST heals.
I also have a Demon/Pain Mastermind and skipped allot of the "Healing" powers except for the auras because I didn't want to be a "healer" but for being the Villain version of Empathy Pain isn't even that great of a Healing set to begin with. The Buffs don't even seem to compare with their Empathy counterparts.
There was some Keyes trial forming on Freedumb where the requirement to join was "Must be 53 with t3 Rebirth, or a Healer". I swear people were smarter before I left.
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Oh, and next time you might want to get your quote right.
To the OP...
I have played my Empathy Defender off and on for 7 years as well as a Kinetics. And, people wanting "healers" is something that occurs in every game. More simplistically, they want to know they have a good measure of "survival" tools at their disposal. Having direct, reliable healing is something that people value. The best way to open people up to the importance of debuffs/buffs as part of their survival is to be willing to play your character well enough that your presence (or lack of) is noticeable.
I remember back when I was leveling my Kinetics Defender. I remember a particular Citadel TF I was on where I was the only real support the team had. I stepped up and did my part as well as I could and there wasn't 1 complaint the entire time.
Yes, there are idiots out there, and I often wonder why I am not bald because of the dumb stuff people do. But, most of the time I just take it as a chance for me to have to play better.
Oh, a couple days ago, I was heartily thanked by someone on a BAF for actually being a real Emp (maintaining heals and buffs for everyone and not just being a healbot). So, yeah, there are people out there who like good empaths to balance out the idiots.
@ Dr Gemini
�If we would come together and be great role models, it would be amazing to see how the next generation turns out.� |
Depends. There have been occasional strong backlash periods when people have swung from "healing is not absolutely necessary" to pushing the opposite extreme assertion that "with bubbles and buffs healing is completely worthless."
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1) With everyone spamming barrier, heals have become worthless, and there's nothing for my "healer" to do during the prisoner escape phase. So now we are gifted with massive amounts of damage to make healing valuable again.
2) My tank feels worthless on these trials because sequestration means I can't even taunt. Well, now you have a reason to taunt again as you need drag antimatter all over the place.
Back to the main topic though:
I suspect that as folks get accustomed to the Keyes trials, people will see less need for healing. My first couple runs I didn't know what to expect, so I expressed a preference for any character with a heal, but now I just advertise the number of open spots, and there are usually enough rebirths running around it doesn't matter. If not, folks get to work on their debt badges. If someone asks me which of their characters I would prefer they bring, I will continue to express a preference for a character with a heal though.
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And, people wanting "healers" is something that occurs in every game. More simplistically, they want to know they have a good measure of "survival" tools at their disposal. Having direct, reliable healing is something that people value.
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Heals are what you use when you've taken damage, and many players ultimately take damage because ironically its only when you take damage that you know you're in over your head. Heals are usually the last ditch mitigation mechanism that will work in the specific situation where people exceed what their other mitigation schemes can deal with, and most players eventually drive themselves to that point.
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It's pointless to summon a trap during a Marauder fight when he's just going to jump across the map 2 sec. later anyway so I just shoot him
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On topic of thread: thems the breaks. Somedays feels like I can't knock a hellion across Perez without hitting an idiot. Somedays the idiot is me. Least we have player notes these days.
The best way to open people up to the importance of debuffs/buffs as part of their survival is to be willing to play your character well enough that your presence (or lack of) is noticeable.
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Anyway... now days this happens more often than no but 7 years ago it was rare. As long as the leader isn't being an idiot and kicking me off the team for blasting and not healing it's pretty well noticed and appreciated that we aren't taking DMG because of my ToHit DeBuffs.
I think part of the reason this is now more than when I first started is a combination of villains lacking any sort of Empathy set when it first came out. Remember Pain is still a relatively new power set that didn't exist for at least the first 4-5 years of Villains. The other part of it is just me having better enhancements than I did 7 years ago. SOs were great unless we had to fight an Arch-Villain then I was pretty much useless because they could resist my DeBuffs. Not entirely useless because they were hitting us less when I had DeBuffs on them than when I was dead but it wasn't enough of a noticeable difference for anyone to really care. Slowly working or replacing allot of SOs with HOs and eventually even Arch-Villains can't resist my DeBuffs. Makes for much more noticeable a difference when I'm there or not there.
Typically Empathy isn't even needed with me around. I've actually had a couple Empaths who don't really bother with their other powers quit teams on me because "I'm bored, someone take DMG already." This has always seemed rare though. Most Empaths have been able to find other things they can do besides heal.
And of course my DeBuffs are getting even better now because of Incarnate powers. I'm pretty sure Giant Monsters are the only ones who can still resist me but it's been a while sense I've fought any with him.
That being said I only use my Traps build for BAF. I have tried both build in all 3 trials but I find stationary abilities to be completely useless when you can't remain stationary while fighting. BAF is the exception because you don't need to move in that one and I find the traps are allot more useful during the escape than just simply shooting at them. Of course I use them on the courts when fighting the AVs but I find them slightly less useful there though still somewhat helpful when we're remaining on the courts and not running all over the map like in a Lambda fighting Marauder. It's pointless to summon a trap during a Marauder fight when he's just going to jump across the map 2 sec. later anyway so I just shoot him.
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Nearly all the /traps powers have a very long duration, and with proper slotting, can actually double stack. Let me go over them really quickly.
Triage Beacon -> Easily perma'ed on SOs. Now, while this is a stationary power that only provides +regen, it has a very large radius (40 feet) which means you can kite around it, or just lay it down, and have the AVs (even marauder and antimatter) stay within that large radius. The extra +regen it provides can help save a squishy or counter act some of the AoE damage that is being thrown around
Acid Mortar -> Again, easily perma on SOs, can even be triple stacked with enough +rech. This power is very unique in its ability to debuff resistance and defense. Each mortar that is fired refreshes the duration of the debuff, and the base duration is 20 seconds. That is per mortar and per pet, so if you manage to get out 3 pets, you can effectively have 3 different 20 seconds timers going on, each providing the -res and -def. Now Marauder on a good team, jumps about every 10 - 20 seconds, so if you drop an acid mortar on him, chances are high that you can drop another pet before the first one expires, even if it only hit him once, due to the initial debuff lasting 20 seconds.
Seeker Drones -> This is a ranged debuff tool, and if your not using it as such, your using it wrong. Its meant to soak the alpha, then debuff the enemys around the explosion. While you can't always control who gets debuffed by it, it can soak some extra damage then explode thus reducing any other incoming damage that is dealt. It is also able to double stack thus doubling its effectiveness as a -dmg and -tohit tool. You also get 2 of them, which while they both spawn in the same place, may pick different targets and with the 5 foot blast radius could debuff an entire group without causing anyone to take any damage. This works wonders on BAFs when you have everything clustered together and on Lambdas to soak the alpha for the weapons cache and containment chamber phase.
Poison trap -> This power has the highest -regeneration power of any of the spammable -regen powers at -1000%. That is enough -regen to completely floor any AVs regen without 1 application. And it can't be interrupted so you can easily toe bomb it at the feet of your intended target. It also explodes into a very large radius (red tomax is saying the initial blast is 16 feet, with the gas spreading out to 25 feet) and stays for 30 seconds, refreshing every 10 seconds, so the debuff effectively lasts for a total of 40 seconds. With a 90 second base recharge, you can double or triple stack this debuff and cause some serious damage to an AVs regeneration powers without using a single other power.
Not including those 4 powers into a /traps build hurts a lot more then it helps, especially on a defender where the debuff values are even higher. While i understand that the league leader was a moron and just wanted 'flashy green numbers' there are plenty other things you could be doing to benefit the team without having to have flashy green numbers. and hey, rebirth is always available so you can provide both passive +regen and Instand Healing level +regen with a hit of your rebirth power.
While i do understand that the leagues have a lot of movement to them, and its hard to stay grouped up during them, completely taking your powers out of your character to run the leagues is doing much more harm then good.
Because having a level shift to 53 and a t3 Rebirth power utterly preclude the possibility of that player being a complete moron who can't avoid the green beam. Wanting Mo(Insert TF) doesn't make someone less dumb for overlooking the obvious. Hell, I've lost count of how many times I've seen a Master run missed specifically because Mr. IHAVESHINY stood in the avoidable death mechanic.
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FYI, meeting the requirements he wanted isn't exactly that hard to do. And, given the fact that a good bit of the damage in the last part is unresistable/unavoidable, I, too, would err on the side of having ample healing/regeneration to compensate.
Come to think of it, I am guessing you are probably mad because you couldn't get in on a good team like his where you know the leader is actually trying to make it possible for everyone to win.
@ Dr Gemini
�If we would come together and be great role models, it would be amazing to see how the next generation turns out.� |
Typically Empathy isn't even needed with me around. I've actually had a couple Empaths who don't really bother with their other powers quit teams on me because "I'm bored, someone take DMG already." This has always seemed rare though. Most Empaths have been able to find other things they can do besides heal. And of course my DeBuffs are getting even better now because of Incarnate powers. I'm pretty sure Giant Monsters are the only ones who can still resist me but it's been a while sense I've fought any with him. |
I actually dislike teaming with people who play Empaths and don't take/slot their secondary powers at least a little bit. Even if you don't use your attacks a lot, thanks to IO bonuses you can get quite a few nifty bonuses from slotting your attacks.
@ Dr Gemini
�If we would come together and be great role models, it would be amazing to see how the next generation turns out.� |
Reminds me of the time I was doing the blueside respec (the Sky Raider one) on my Rad/Rad. She was my first 50 and this was when I was leveling her so it was shortly after EU launch.
We got into the reactor building and after a wipe or two at the first doorway, the leader who was also the tank told me to "stop using that green s**t and just heal!" I tried to explain that the "green s**t" was what was keeping us alive a lot longer than my crappy AoE heal but he was having none of it (I just love how there's always someone in an MMO who knows how to play your character better than you do, despite having never played those powersets ). So I dutifully stopped debuffing or blasting and just spammed my heal. And of course the team wiped in about 10 seconds flat as I was the only support character on the team. Finally after a few of these wipes I asked if I should start using the "green s**t" again and got a grudging "Fine" from the leader. I don't know if we actually completed the trial (but I rather doubt it) but if nothing else, at least 7 people on Defiant got an object lesson in the power of Rad's debuffs that day. |
In broadcast I could here the two teams, comprised mainly of tanks and scarppers I think, trying to coordinate and complaining that their attacks didn't seem to be doing much damage. I decided to find the battle and debuff the beast. I threw both my debuffs on Babbage and then started to attack (each of my attacks obviously causing more debuff). moments later AMAZINGLY Babbage was dead. As I flew away I could hear the two teams congratulating one another "WE ROCK!" and I laughed wondering if they'd have every finished or just given up if the lowly little defender no one wanted hadn't shown up. DefBot went on to successfully help defeat every GM blueside and added in the defeat of countless AVs. All thanks to that green S%$t.
�We�re always the good guys. In D&D, we�re lawful good. In City of Heroes we�re the heroes. In Grand Theft Auto we pay the prostitutes promptly and never hit them with a bat.� � Leonard
�Those women are prostitutes? You said they were raising money for stem cell research!� � Sheldon
Looking at the entire list of Defender primaries, and what they're capable of in a "healing" context:
So yes, any dimbrick that sees the blue shield and automatically assumes "h3410rz!!!" is exactly that... a moron. |
He will honor his words; he will definitely carry out his actions. What he promises he will fulfill. He does not care about his bodily self, putting his life and death aside to come forward for another's troubled besiegement. He does not boast about his ability, or shamelessly extol his own virtues. - Sima Qian.
Perhaps I should clarify something here. Usually when ever someone asks a dark "not to attack and just heal" that excludes the use of Twilight Grasp as it requires attacking an enemy in order to use it. This means while there is a heal power available I can't just stop attacking and heal as attacking is a requirement for a dark to be able to heal. No attacks = no heal.
This is not the same for an Empathy Defender who can heal allies without ever attacking a single enemy. It's a catch 22 so to speak. Your only heal power on a Dark requires an enemy to use it but your team orders you not to attack. You can't heal without attacking so they get mad at you for not healing. You try to start healing but then they just get mad at you for attacking again. And trying to explain this to anyone that doesn't understand how Twilight Grasp works in nearly impossible. |
He will honor his words; he will definitely carry out his actions. What he promises he will fulfill. He does not care about his bodily self, putting his life and death aside to come forward for another's troubled besiegement. He does not boast about his ability, or shamelessly extol his own virtues. - Sima Qian.
Um.... no.
Keyes is one of the few times I'll understand the "Just heal," thanks to the pulses. It, MS raids, etc. it's understandable to "rock the aura" on. Still annoying as hell, but understandable. And I still hate having my Emps referred to as "healers." That said, a Dark still has to *hit* to "heal," and that's the only thing they have to "heal" WITH. An Empath, by comparison, has numerous means of hit point replacement (though I'd generally suggest to one NOT to use share pain, thanks to the whole "Now *I* can't heal" bit.) Heal for less, sure, but that's because short of dying just as the heal goes off, it's a guaranteed heal. Besides, with all the good Dark/ does, it's ridiculous to tell someone not to do everything ELSE. |
He will honor his words; he will definitely carry out his actions. What he promises he will fulfill. He does not care about his bodily self, putting his life and death aside to come forward for another's troubled besiegement. He does not boast about his ability, or shamelessly extol his own virtues. - Sima Qian.
I'm sorry for being an attentive and active Empathy Healer on the Trials and giving everyone the wrong impression about Defenders.
It's kind of refreshing to see game content that actually makes healing powers valuable and appreciated.
And, idiots are idiots, stop playing on Freedum.